Waste not, want not

Schools waste $5 million a day in uneaten food. Here's how Oakland is

reinventing the cafeteria

By Jonathan Bloom on Nov 28, 2018

The red plum’s presence confounds the third grader. She didn’t want the fruit in the first
place, yet there it is. She doesn’t want to eat it, but she knows that tossing it into the
garbage at Oakland’s Hoover Elementary School is wrong. Standing before containers
for trash, recyclables, compostables, and unopened entrees, milk cartons, and whole
fruit, the girl’s decision-making matches her Disney-movie hijab — Frozen.

Fortunately, Nancy Deming, the school district’s sustainability manager for custodial
and nutritional services, is supervising the sorting line today. “If you’ve started eating
your fruit, it goes in the compost,” she reminds the girl with a smile. “If you haven’t
taken a bite, it goes to Food Share.” The girl glances at the plum, then carefully places it
in the clear bin, from which students can take whatever unopened or unbitten foods
they please. Anything left will either be offered the next day or donated to a local
hunger-relief organization.

For decades, students here and there have made use of designated tables in school lunch
rooms to leave or pick up unwanted whole fruit, packaged foods, or other meal items.
Although rare in most school districts, Deming has standardized the practice and made
it mandatory for schools serving some 37,000 students in Oakland. As the only school
employee in the country whose sole responsibility is fighting food waste, Deming has
transformed the Oakland Unified School District — and somewhat reluctantly herself —
into a national leader. With her help, the district has arguably done more than any other
in the country to minimize excess food, redistribute edible leftovers to people in need,
and compost the inevitable inedibles.

No one condones trashing edible food, especially when 12 percent of U.S.

households don’t know where their next meal is coming from. And it has serious
environmental consequences: Agriculture generates a third of U.S. greenhouse gas
emissions, and roughly a fifth of the nation’s pesticide, water, and fertilizer usage goes
into growing food that will nourish no one. It’s also a waste of money. Researchers
estimate that 40 percent of the American food supply isn’t eaten, a shopping cart worth
$218 billion.

Schools are a big part of the problem. The USDA’s National School Lunch Program
serves 30 million kids every school day, a point of justifiable pride. But the program also
wastes about $5 million worth of edible food every school day. That’s $1.2 billion in
losses per school year. The price tag is bad enough, but tacitly teaching children that it’s
OK to throw out untouched portions of cheese ravioli and chicken tenders may be even
worse.

Why do schools waste so much? The quality of food can be questionable, given the lack
of on-site cooking facilities and minimal USDA funding. And many students end up with
food that they don’t want, thanks to a USDA reimbursement requirement that students
take lunch items from at least three out of five categories — vegetable, fruit, protein,
grains, and milk. At least one of those choices must be a fruit or vegetable. In theory,
having food choices reduces waste, but students aren’t allowed to take just one or two
items they know they’ll eat. Aiming for the federal government to cover a “reimbursable
meal,” staff often push students to take more.
Since Deming can’t alter these requirements, she’s ensured that every school in her
district has a food-waste safety net: the Food Share table, with signs in five languages.
When the process — which the USDA now endorses — works well, it’s elegant. During a
breakfast service at Piedmont Avenue Elementary, students can choose between a
muffin and cheese stick combination and an Eggo mini-pancake package. When a boy
interested only in a muffin drops his cheese stick on the sharing table, an attentive girl
snags it within seconds.

Deming has also established a “Take It & Go” initiative that allows students to bring
unfinished fruit and packaged vegetables back to their classrooms — forbidden in many
schools — and she’s working on a program that allows schools to share excess food with
families in the school community. On Deming’s watch, share tables have expanded from
a few schools to all 80 of Oakland Unified’s K-12 schools, and composting has more than
tripled to serve two-thirds of them. Deming has become a sought-after speaker at food
conferences, including this summer’s U.S. Food Waste Summit at Harvard University.
Intent on helping other districts, she recently published a K-12 School Food Recovery
Roadmap that guides school employees and volunteers through the often-convoluted
waste-reduction process, including tips on fundraising, waste tracking, and engaging
with staff.

Deming, who grew up in San Diego, has always had a feel for the environment. She
embraced composting while working at American Soil Products, based in the Bay Area,
then ran her own sustainable gardening and edible landscaping company. When her
daughter, who’s now 17, started at Sequoia Elementary in Oakland, Deming got involved
with a playground renovation, then noted the school’s lack of composting and recycling
and its ever-burning lights. After volunteering to work on school sustainability for a
school year, she won a grant to tackle food-scrap composting. She worked as an
independent contractor for four years, earning the trust of both the nutrition and
custodial departments, before the school district named her its first-ever sustainability
manager.

The title matters. Deming says schools often waste food for the simple reason that fixing
the problem is nobody’s priority. Hiring a sustainability manager requires resources,
and Oakland Unified is especially strapped (this June, the district cut an afterschool
dinner program that fed as many as 3,000 low-income students). That reality explains
why Deming’s position is part-time, why she’s become an adept grant-writer, and why
most of her salary comes from the district’s waste hauler, Waste Management.

Even when schools are committed to waste reduction, they face bureaucratic and
logistical challenges. When Deming first proposed share tables, the district’s
Environmental Health Department raised food safety concerns. Deming quelled some
with compromise. For example, she agreed to quit re-serving fruit with edible peels —
apples, pears, plums — if a virus broke out. She created Food Share guidelines that spell
out how to arrange food share bins; segregate hot and cool items; teach kids share-table
rules; and clean up and re-serve or donate share items. To maintain food bound for
redistribution, Deming recently won a CalRecycle Food Waste Prevention and Rescue
Grant, which will pay for a refrigerated truck and additional refrigerators and freezers in
the schools.

Milk is another bête noire in Deming’s world. Contravening urban myth, the
government has not, since 1982, required students receiving lunch to take cartons of
milk. Yet some staff continue to push the cartons on students. In response, Deming
posted signs that read “Only take it if you want to drink it.” When she reminded
cafeteria staff that the USDA encourages schools to wipe down and re-serve unopened
milk cartons, they balked, unhappy to take back food handled by “germy, messy kids,”
Deming says. “Well, you have to wash it and make sure it’s in good shape. But think of
food at the grocery store. How many sets of hands have touched that food?”
She recalls other ripples of resistance. Like any manager, Deming needs numbers: how
many items aren’t served, how many milks and apples are left on the share table? But
the schools’ underpaid staff, working fixed hours, were hesitant to take on the extra task.
To change their minds, Deming demonstrated and timed the task with a Nutrition
staffer. After discovering it took a single minute, the staffers were converted.

The school district’s success in reducing waste can’t be separated from its economic
context. Despite a resurgent downtown, poverty has literally pitched a tent in Oakland,
with hundreds of homeless encampments. That harsh reality makes tackling food waste
an easier ask for cafeteria staff, custodians, and decision makers “because nobody
questions the idea,” Deming says. “It’s like, ‘Oh yes, let’s figure that out.’”

One out of five residents of Oakland’s Alameda County seeks help from the county’s
community food bank, according to StopWaste, an agency that helps schools perform
waste audits, increase their composting, and implement food sharing. Some two-thirds
of those in need are children and seniors. Fully three-quarters of the district’s students
receive free or reduced-price lunch.

Knowing that some kids don’t get enough to eat motivates Tanya Davis to promote the
share table. Universally known as “Miss T,” Davis has spent 27 years in Oakland Unified,
the last two as a custodian at Edna Brewer Middle School, where she set up a Food
Share table last year. She beams as she tells me her simple message: “‘Don’t waste it,
because some kids don’t eat enough at home.’ Those kids will sit near the share table
and they keep an eye on it. And when something they want is put on it, the food’s gone
in a flash.”

Several Hoover fifth graders I speak with know that their school is one of the six
Oakland Unified schools donating meals to a shelter or center for the elderly. When I
ask Vanaja Evans, a 10-year-old, to tell me about the Share Table, she says, “It goes to
the homeless people. It makes me feel good inside because I know that some people
can’t afford food. It’s easy to leave our food in the share bin.”

“At this school, we don’t waste things,” says Aamyah Legorreta, another 10-year-old fifth
grader at Hoover. “There’s a sign that says, ‘If you don’t want me, don’t take me.’ And
then the Food Share — someone comes to pick it up and give it to the homeless center. I
think it’s nice and helpful to give it to the homeless, because they don’t have enough
food or a home. If we just waste it, it’s not really fair.”

That someone collecting the food is John Holloway, who takes it to a homeless center
called Berkeley Drop In, where Holloway works as a drug and alcohol counselor. Most
days, Holloway drives his 2007 Pontiac Grand Prix sedan to Hoover and one other
school to collect unserved wrapped entrees or those left on the share table. He also
collects surplus school milk and fruit for the South Berkeley day shelter. Were it not for
these fresh, varied, and nutrient-dense foods, the men would be stuck with a buffet of
packaged bagels and muffins.

On a recent Monday, Holloway collected 81 meals from Hoover. “That was a big day
because the kids really don’t like that ravioli. But the men here like it,” Holloway says.
“The most popular is chicken trays with rice and, oh, turkey with mashed potatoes and
gravy. They love that.”

Across the country, school trash cans full of edible food are the norm. Fewer than 5
percent of K-12 schools send food out to be composted. Only around 500 out of about
 98,000 public schools have share tables — that’s half of 1 percent. And fewer still have
active food donation programs, aided by national nonprofits like Food Rescue and Food
Bus. What’s stopping the rest from donating? Inertia, mostly, and an unfounded fear of
liability. The USDA reminded school food directors in 2012 that schools donating food
are protected from liability under the Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Act. The response
has been slow, as most districts lack a Deming.

Back in Oakland, Deming is finding more ways to fight food waste. She’s encouraging
schools to use their surplus food to help feed students’ families by relaunching a
program called Food for Families. And she continues pushing schools to hold recess
before lunch — a simple shift that improves appetites and keeps kids focused on eating.

Still, Deming’s most potent weapon against waste may be her focus and pragmatism.
After ensuring that the Hoover Elementary third grader’s plum would eventually be
eaten by other students, Deming learns that Holloway is having car trouble, a bit of hard
luck that would send much of that day’s surplus to be composted rather than donated.
She pauses and sighs audibly, then quickly shifts her attention to the children
approaching with leftover snacks to share and waste to sort.

Simple Solutions to
Reduce Food Waste in
Schools
Posted by Aaron Thein on Nov 18, 2016 9:00:00 AM

With over 30 million students participating in the National School Lunch

Program (NSLP) everyday, you might not be surprised to hear that those same students
generate over $600 million in food waste each year.  Making an effort to reduce food
waste can save your operation money, increase meal consumption in the lunchroom,
and help minimize your school's impact on the environment.

Here are some simple solutions to reduce food waste before it happens, recover

foods that are on their way to the trash, and recycle food waste that might otherwise
end up in a landfill:

Back of House

 Review sales report in your point of sale system to see which items are less
popular.  Consider replacing or reformulating them for broader appeal.
 Engage with your students to find out what could be improved and recruit them to
sample new food items you'd like to offer.
 Take pride in the work you and your staff are doing in the kitchen. Promote menu
items on Facebook or your district's website to get parents and students excited about
what you're offering.
 When purchasing fresh produce, order in shorter intervals and use the Food
Buying Guide to help determine how much to order.
 Use Cycle Menus for greater predictability when ordering.
 Expand Offer versus Served at lower grade levels.
 Store, cook, hold, and cool foods to their proper temperature using food code
guidelines.
 Store produce in air tight containers to extend the life of the product and
date/label it so oldest items are used first.
 Determine if precut produce or scratch cooking can cut down on waste.
 See if ingredient by-products can be incorporated into other planned recipes.

Front of House

 Set expectations with staff for proper food handling, preparation, and storage
techniques using training opportunities offered through NSFMI.
 Hold recess before lunch and give students at least 25 minutes to eat.
 Follow Smarter Lunchroom strategies such as:
o Place fruit in two different spots on the lunch line. Try featuring whole fruit
in a nice bowl by the register.
o Give fruits and veggies creative names like x-ray vision carrots.
o Make white milk 1/3 of milk available and place it in front of flavored milk.
o Use colorful, attractive signs to draw attention to “fresh fruit/subs/salads
today!”

 Set up a "share table" that allows kids to place packaged or pre-portioned items
they are not going to consume for donation to eligible food banks or charitable
organizations.  Although the USDA permits food donations, it's important to consult with
your local health department for further guidance.
 Reach out to non-profit organizations such as Food Bus, which can help schools
navigate through the logistics of donating left over food items.

 Compost food waste for school gardens.

 Work with local farmers on composting or food scrap projects.
 Use separate waste bins for recycle, food donations, compost and trash.

Implementing just a handful of these solutions can go a long way towards reducing food
waste in your schools and getting students excited about the positive impact their
making on the environment.  Sign up for the U.S. Food Waste Challenge to share your
story on how you are reducing, recovering, or recycling food waste in your schools.